Finding Inspiration in Motherhood and Other Messy Things

Menu

Tag Archives: strawberries

I made some Strawberry Butter with my kids for a fun sweet treat, so I wanted to share it with you.

It was super simple to make (just 3 ingredients), and it made for a fun snack or breakfast dish.

It’s the type of dish you could make when you wake up in the morning for a fresh homemade breakfast with very little effort.

The first time we made it, my oldest daughter said it was actually too sweet, so we adjusted it for less sugar the next time, which is what you’ll find in the printable recipe below.

It was also a nice way to use up some extra strawberries, since my girls prefer to eat strawberries only when they’re fresh and crisp. Once they start to get soft, I have to incorporate them into a recipe. They won’t eat “mushy” berries.

But mushy or crisp strawberries both work for this.

You could use the butter to top any kind of bagel or English muffin or pancakes, but we like it in the King’s Hawaiian Sweet Rolls, which is what you see in my photos.

Make sure your butter is completely room temperature when you start, to make it a quick and simple process. If you’re going to make it in the morning, leave the butter out overnight.

You can refrigerate this Strawberry Butter if you don’t use it all right away, but allow it to come to room temperature before serving. Or at least don’t use it right out of the fridge, because it will be too stiff.

In a small bowl, beat the butter and sugar with a mixer until light and fluffy. Stir in the strawberries and mix well by hand.

Serve immediately or store in the refrigerator. Bring to room temperature before serving for best results. Best if used within three days.

Note: You can use salted or unsalted butter for this. The salted butter will balance out the sweetness. And you can use fresh or frozen strawberries, but keep in mind the frozen strawberries may add more juice to the butter, and be sure to thaw them fully first.

With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, I’ve already started adding fun Valentines-themed snacks to my kid’s lunches.

The top picture is of heart-shaped strawberries.

Okay, okay… they’re not obviously hearts upon first glance, so I did mention to my girls ahead of time that they were getting strawberry hearts in their lunch bags. Just in case my artfulness didn’t shine through right away.

Anyway, to make quick strawberry treats that vaguely resemble hearts, follow these steps:

You can also toss those extra strawberry pieces into a bowl of cereal or oatmeal, by the way.

And onto the next photo…. I used a tiny {about 1-inch} cookie cutter to cut hearts out of American cheese slices and flour tortillas.

I cut out about twice as many tortilla hearts as cheese ones because my oldest likes to assemble her own cheese sandwiches out of the pieces.

The last photo doesn’t have anything heart-shaped, but instead includes something red.

I tossed a few red M&Ms {leftover from Christmas} into a container of nuts. Cashews, specifically, since I think they taste better than peanuts, and there are kids in my daughters’ classes with peanut allergies.

My girls will eat the nuts without any extra incentive, but I felt the dash of red color just added a little fun.

And if you’re wondering about the containers I had the cashews in, these are the ones I use:

My girls love getting snacks in these little triangle containers. They’re technically condiment containers, but they’re easy to open {even for my 2yo} and they hold plenty of food.

Not a LOT of food, mind you, but a handful of nuts or raisins or goldfish or about 5 or 6 grapes. Enough for a snack.

Oh, and I also cut apple slices and used the same heart shaped cookie cutter to remove the seeds, thus putting a heart in the middle of the circle slice. But I forgot to photograph those. I’ll try to remember next time. :)

Please share any fun Valentine’s snacks you’ve made for your own kiddos!

**********EDIT: Aug 2015**********

Aaaaaand….. now that I’ve been making heart strawberries in a way that’s SO much easier for a while now, I should probably update this post! ;)

Anyway, after I wrote this, I discovered that it was way easier to just cut the strawberry in half and use a small heart-shaped cookie cutter to cut out the heart. Takes two seconds and looks amazing! Plus – the cuteness factor means my kids eat more fruit! (Even at school!!!)

Check it out:

And you can see that I used one of the larger heart-shaped cutters for the sandwiches. Since peanut butter and (strawberry) jelly can get a little messy, I sometimes cut out the bread first and then fill them instead of making the sandwich ahead of time and then cutting out the heart.

I developed this recipe when I made the Bunny cookies because I wanted to incorporate cream cheese into both the cookie itself and the icing. And the results were sooooooooooo good.

Above are most of the ingredients. Just add a little confectionery sugar and vanilla extract for the icing, and that’s all you need.

Simple, right?

When you cream together the butter, cream cheese, and egg for the cookie dough, it should look nice and creamy like this.

Then mix in the cake mix and extra flour.

It’s a soft dough, so you’ll need to refrigerate it before rolling it out.

And if it’s still a little too soft to handle, just knead in a bit of flour.

Sprinkle some flour over your counter generously before rolling out the dough.

And be sure to keep the dough a little thick. The cookies need to be thick and just-ever-so-slightly undercooked so that you can bite through them and the icing without the icing squirting out all over the place.

In a large bowl, use a mixer to cream together the butter and cream cheese. Add egg and vanilla and blend until fluffy.

Slowly sprinkle in the cake mix and flour and blend until combined.

Shape cookie dough into a flattened disc, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least a half hour.

Preheat oven to 375°F. Roll out dough to a 1/4 inch thick on a lightly floured surface. (If you want to make a sandwich cookie with a cutter that is not symmetrical, then make sure you cut out an equal number of matching cookies, using both sides of the cookie cutter.)

Bake on parchment lined cookie sheets for 5 to 8 minutes, depending on the size and thickness of your cookies. They should not yet be noticeably browning on the edges. Do not overcook them or your sandwiches will be difficult to eat.

Allow cookies to rest on the hot pan for a few minutes, then remove to cooling racks. Cool cookies completely before adding icing.

Recipes:

Crafts:

My Recent Posts

Follow Blog via Email

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 207 other followers

Disclaimer: Sometimes I feature links on my blog that lead to affiliate websites. If you click on these links and make a purchase from that website, I may receive a small compensation, but it will NOT change the price you pay. Thanks in advance!